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Votela Gives VARs a No-Quota Way to Shift to Recurring Revenue

VARs and integrators who are stuck in the upfront compensation model, but know they need to move to recurring revenue, now have a no-quota option for starting that journey.

Votela, the sole carrier/distributor of Siemens OpenScape Cloud Services in North America, does not enforce numbers goals, which means IT partners still can meet commitments to other vendors while selling Votela platforms that provide monthly, rather than up-front, income. Avatar TechVentures is the latest VAR to take advantage of that model, Votela announced this week at ITEXPO in Austin, Texas.

In the meantime, Votela also is formulating an agent program that would feature full training and support; Votela would handle the billing for its agents. But that's only a temporary approach. Votela's ultimate goal is to fold its agents under its VAR and integrator partners, so they oversee agent sales and billing. For now, Votela still must beef up its VAR roster. The company aims to add 100-150 IT partners – which may not necessarily be agents – per year.

"We love channels," Votela CEO Adam Cole told Channel Partners.

To join Votela's program, all partners must be Siemens-certified. Votela offers the training to achieve this designation and, incidentally, now uses the MSPAlliance Unified Certification Standard (UCS). UCS is an independent business accreditation similar to a SAS70 Audit for the cloud computing and managed services industry.

Partners then sell unified communications as-a-service, bundled to end users' specifications. Votela and Siemens deliver the seats to VARs and integrators (and, soon, agents) for less than $20 and partners then resell at their own prices. The services can be packaged with non-Siemens products as well, so VARs may continue with their professional and managed services practices.